The tea leaves
Member
Join Date: Sep 2008
Posts: 95
I recall a few years ago when I was in a treatment program, the way they addressed changing behaviors. We get in routines that prompt the familiar patterns associated with our using whatever is our drug of choice. They suggested ways of breaking that routine. No way was I going to break my routine, I couldn't, or so I thought. Especially not when it came to matters of my work, or matters of recreation for that matter. Not so coincidentally, because I wouldn't break the routine that prompted my use, the internal battles raged on. I couldn't stop.
It wasn't until I got serious about quitting, about employing that idea of changing my routine, that I started to see some chance of a way out of the stuck mindset I was in. In some ways the changes needed to be drastic, but in other ways, just tweaking my schedule was enough. Instead of doing some task associated with smoking in the morning, I moved it to the afternoon, to a time I didn't normally use. Instead of sitting down in the evening to relax to music and a joint, I listened to music earlier and worked later, which interfered with my smoking time. I needed to reassociate almost everything in my life so not to habitually use. At least that gave me a bit more control over when I used, because the familiar triggers of familiar routine were gone.
I don't know if you have the opportunity to make radical changes but even small ones can be significant. I also know I'm practiced in the art of distraction, I can busy myself elsewhere with something other than using, and have basically reorganized my life so I can function again. Maybe that's not the ideal solution, but it seems to work for me.
This site is a fantastic source of encouragement. I hope you keep reading and writing.
It wasn't until I got serious about quitting, about employing that idea of changing my routine, that I started to see some chance of a way out of the stuck mindset I was in. In some ways the changes needed to be drastic, but in other ways, just tweaking my schedule was enough. Instead of doing some task associated with smoking in the morning, I moved it to the afternoon, to a time I didn't normally use. Instead of sitting down in the evening to relax to music and a joint, I listened to music earlier and worked later, which interfered with my smoking time. I needed to reassociate almost everything in my life so not to habitually use. At least that gave me a bit more control over when I used, because the familiar triggers of familiar routine were gone.
I don't know if you have the opportunity to make radical changes but even small ones can be significant. I also know I'm practiced in the art of distraction, I can busy myself elsewhere with something other than using, and have basically reorganized my life so I can function again. Maybe that's not the ideal solution, but it seems to work for me.
This site is a fantastic source of encouragement. I hope you keep reading and writing.
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: UK
Posts: 263
So I've been running around the forums here tonight with some glee, being lovely and stuff, slapping my graffiti here and there with a certain odd sense of self-satisfaction. Now, while I ascert that everything I have posted on this forum tonight, and indeed ever, is... well, true and heartfelt, there are some issues.
Here's some pale horrible facts.
Here's some pale horrible facts.
- Right here, right now, it's 2.49am. By the time I've published this post it will be later.
- I've drunk a bottle of white wine and followed it up with many shots of Bacardi, which I don't even like, with apple juice, which is not even a mixer but I can't find any cola in the house.
- My wife has just come into the room and been extremely angry with me because she is going to work in the morning, which means that I am responsible for getting the kids to school
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